


the Political breed of America

by musicforswimming



Category: National Treasure (2004)
Genre: Gen, Racebending Revenge Challenge
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2010-07-02
Updated: 2010-07-02
Packaged: 2017-10-10 08:45:55
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 727
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/97817
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/musicforswimming/pseuds/musicforswimming
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Ben at Georgetown.</p>
            </blockquote>





	the Political breed of America

**Author's Note:**

> Fun fact: ever since I did a Chromatic Casting of this movie, I have loved it a little less because I keep being disappointed that Ben isn't actually played by Dwayne "The Rock" Johnson. The title is from a 1790 petition to Congress from the Pennsylvania Society for the Abolition of Slavery signed by the Society's President, Benjamin Franklin; the petition can be seen [here](http://www.archives.gov/legislative/features/franklin/) at the National Archives website.

Ben's moving into his apartment in Northwest -- nice building, mostly other students, with roughly a third of them moving today so that the stairs boast congestion to rival the Beltway at its worst -- when a guy on the floor below offers him two hundred to help them "after you're done there". The accent is rural Pennsylvania, and Ben laughs, because there's nothing else to say to that and he's too tired from hauling boxes up three flights of stairs in August in Washington DC to try and explain (to someone who, as a fellow post-grad at Georgetown, ought to know better than to make the assumption to begin with) that he's a student here, too and also why that was a really stupid thing to say.

The guy's eyes get wide, and he follows Ben's cue and laughs nervously and asks what he's studying, but Ben's already picking up his box again and dragging it the rest of the way up the stairs. It's the books, and he shouldn't have put them all in one box, but he wanted to know right where they all were. The box occupies a prime space in the middle of the floor; the first piece of furniture to get put up is the bookshelf and then, before the pots and pans or the toilet paper, toothbrush, and towel, or the bed, he slits the tape on the box of books and starts organizing them on the shelf.

He'll buy textbooks on Monday, but in the meantime these are the ones he really cared about, the ones Grandpa had collected and Dad had sighed over when Grandpa died and Ben insisted on keeping them.

"They're all out of date!" Dad tried once more, but the note of surrender was in his voice, the one that meant he'd given up trying to talk sense to Ben. "They've probably all been discredited by now -- but you know what, son, fine. You want to drag them with you every time you move, go right ahead."

They both know very well that they're symbols, of course -- to Ben, the collection of books that Grandpa carefully put together through letters, because of course the folks opening the envelope wouldn't know what color hand signed the check or typed up the letter.

In classes, everyone looks at him now and then; it's actually a little bit comforting to think that it's just the family's reputation as treasure hunters that does it. _Of course, the novelty of _Black_ treasure hunters may have something to do with it, too,_ is the thought that follows, and it always seems to be in his father's voice. _We're quite the little American specimens, aren't we, Ben?_

During a "study session" at the Tombs that, of course, turned into beer glasses being drained and books staying firmly closed inside of backpacks, one of his classmates starts to say something about how it's kind of unusual, isn't it? Ben knows exactly what he means, but the beer's mellowed him in some ways and fired him up in others, so he lets the guy talk himself in circles around the fact of a notorious family of kooks and treasure hunters, and Black to boot.

Finally, Ben picks up his glass, takes another drink, and smiles. "How long has your family been here, Pat?" he asks, and the guy, bright red, mumbles something about his grandfather bringing the family over from Ireland when his Dad was a kid.

Ben grins, and deals his trump card. "My grandfather's grandfather's grandfather's family were bought by Charles Carroll in 1799," he says, and then, just for fun, he adds, "of course, they might've been there for awhile before that, but not every household was careful about its records where slaves were concerned, and, you know, with the way they were traded and families were broken up, you can't be entirely sure of exactly when they might've come into the country -- if it _was_ a country then, and not the Colonies still." He drains his glass, goes to get another beer, and when he comes back, they just ask him about the treasure instead.

Ben supposes he'd rather have them laughing at his family for their obsession. But he's not sorry when the topic turns to the basketball team, and until he meets Ian, he never mentions the books to anyone.


End file.
